Implants intended for anchorage in hard tissue, particularly bone tissue, have enjoyed an ever increasing use in odontology, orthopedics, neurosurgery, hand surgery and plastic and reconstructive surgery. Long term anchorage of implants in bone has been achieved with titanium, and it can be assumed that titanium-based materials also in the future will be used to a large extent as the material of choice for implants and prosthesis.
A clinical problem when dealing with so called osseointegration is the fact that the implant cannot be subjected to a load before sufficient bone anhorage has been achieved, which may require as much as 6 to 9 months. It is therefore clinically of utmost importance to accelerate the healing process by providing stimulated bone formation in association with the implants. There is also a need to regenerate bone in order to bridge defects or sections where bone resorption has taken place in for example toothless parts of jaws or where bone tissue has been lost due to e.g. trauma, tumor or surgery.